Sharing insights from the nation’s leading benefits conference.
Marla Moskal, Vice President of Marketing
This week, I attended the Human Resource Executive Health & Benefits Leadership Conference in Las Vegas, along with Winnie Tantraporn, Vice President of Employer Sales, Steve Weissblum, Chief Revenue Officer, and Dr. Mike Bibighaus, Founder and Chief Medical Officer. We met with HR leaders and learned about their companies, ranging in size and across all industries, and learned about the challenges they are facing with their workforces. Access to mental health benefits was top-of-mind, as were challenges with educating and engaging employees with their benefits. Some had a mix of point solutions in place and were looking to consolidate to save money and deliver a more streamlined patient experience. Others were starting to build out their virtual health benefits further and were looking for new partners to fit unmet needs.
Here are some of the top questions, along with our answers, from our discussions with HR leaders this week:
Q: What do you do?
A: We are a digital-first health solution. We provide your employees with immediate access to care through our mobile app, online, or over the phone, plus our 24/7 telehealth triage, treatment, and navigation service. With digital and physical care merging, we are expanding to offer patients with care right where they are, in the comfort of their home, for services like in-home labs or dispatching a paramedic to the home to check on vital signs when needed. We were founded by Emergency Medicine providers in 2015 and have now grown to serve over 2 million patients and over 600 clients.
Q: Are you like Teladoc?
A: We have some things in common with Teladoc, but we have more differences than similarities. We do offer 24/7 telehealth, just like they do. Here’s what sets up apart:
- Care coordination: we call 100% of our patients after a consult to check-in to ensure that they are doing well and to see if they need anything else. We have our own team of compassionate care coordinators who do all of the follow-up, including getting prescriptions to the patient’s preferred pharmacy or referring to in-network providers if needed, for instance.
- Dedicated team of ER providers: unlike other telehealth providers who contract their providers, we employ our own team. This allows us to really get to know our patients, spend more dedicated time with them, and connect with them quickly – in 7 minutes on average vs. 20-30 minutes or longer with other telehealth providers. We employ Emergency Medicine trained Physicians, Physician Assistants and Nurse Practitioners. Because of their training and years of experience working in the ER, they don’t turn away any patient. Our team can triage and treat 96% of all patients and resolve those cases virtually.
- Patient experience: we put the patient first and have designed all aspects of our experience with that in mind. We take a collaborative approach with our clients to ensure that employees are engaging with the benefit, getting 60% utilization on average vs. other telehealth providers with 10-20%.
- In-home care: while we believe that all care should begin digitally, it doesn’t have to end there. If a patient would benefit from having someone sent to his or her location to check on vital signs, do diagnostics, or draw labs, we can send an EMT or paramedics to the home to work alongside one of our providers virtually to treat the patient.
Q: My employees are spread out across the country. Can you handle different geographies?
A: Yes! Our providers are licensed in all 50 states and can provide care anywhere, even in rural areas.
Q: My employees are not very digitally engaged. Would your solution work for my population?
A: Patients can access us and speak to a doctor over the phone. You don’t need a smartphone or a computer to start. And, we work with all of our clients to develop a custom communications plan to ensure that your employees are aware of the benefit and know how and when to use it.
Q: Can you handle unions? What about the tech industry? Companies with over 5,000 employees? What about companies with less than 500 employees?
A: Our current clients span across many different industries and sizes. We can accommodate all types of employer groups.
Q: Can you handle mental health? Why should I partner with you instead of a mental health point solution?
A: Yes, we have a team of behavioral health providers. Unlike other virtual mental health providers, we are able to take an integrated approach to providing care, looking at the patient’s medical concerns with our team of ER providers, and the patient’s mental health with a therapist or psychiatrist. Our providers and care coordinators all work together to ensure that the patient gets the right care at the right time. Patients can connect with a therapist within minutes – not within hours like with some other providers – so that they get care in their moment of need.
Q: How do you calculate savings? What kind of savings can you achieve?
A: Our clients save by avoiding expensive ER, Urgent Care, and Office Visit claims. We are able to offer a custom claims analysis for prospective clients to estimate savings based on their population. Our employer group clients can see savings of up to 60%.
We look forward to connecting with more leaders in the health and benefits space at other conferences and events this year. In the meantime, if you are an HR leader or benefits decision maker looking to provide your employees with a solution that will change the way that they access healthcare, contact us to learn more.
